Election officials to the remotest corners of India to set up polling stations.
India’s general election ended on June 1. About 642 million voters cast ballots in the seven-phase, six-week election, the largest election in history.
The world’s most important elections involved more than a million polling stations across the country, from the most remote corners of the Himalayas to the most remote forests of Nagaland. Each polling station hosted a maximum of 1,500 people.
The procedure affected more than 15 million people, 400,000 vehicles, approximately 1,700 air departures and 135 trains that traveled throughout the country.
Each polling station used electronic voting machines (EVMs) that were first installed in 1982. Instead of casting a ballot, the electorate voted by pressing a button next to the candidate’s call and the party symbol. It was widely implemented in the country from 2000 onwards.
For the 2024 elections, nearly 1. 8 million voter-verifiable paper audit trail systems (VVPATs) and 1. 7 million computers were deployed at 1. 05 million polling stations.
The VVPAT formula is for the EVM to verify the vote. Print out a small piece of paper with the symbol and name of the candidate you voted for. This is visual to the voter for a short period of time and can then be used through the Election Commission of India (ECI) to determine the votes.
However, EVMs have received complaints that they are vulnerable to manipulation. Opposition parties say all documents will have to be counted to rule out hacking of machines or other manipulations.
The Commission states that “these are not EVMs programmed several times, nor manipulated by connection to a mobile phone, Bluetooth devices, replacement of components thereof or by any other form of manipulation”.
The Indian courts have largely approved EVMs.
After voting, voters get a mark of purple ink on their index finger to signify that they have voted.
ICE rules state that no voter should be more than 2 km from a polling station. This means that in densely populated areas of the country, in states such as Karnataka, the distribution of polling stations tends to follow a similar trend to the population. density.
Clusters of stations in giant cities and towns, as well as populated road networks, are evident. Rivers and rugged, populated terrain or jungle look like empty spaces.
Karnataka, with 60 million inhabitants, is one of the most populous states in India. This year, it has just over 46,000 polling stations, as shown in the map below.
For such a mammoth exercise, only about 11 million government officials and security forces were deployed, traveling on foot, by road, in special trains, in helicopters and on boats.
Many places are located in remote spaces with few facilities. More than 80,000 stations studied by the CIS lacked cellular connectivity, and only about 20,000 were located in forested or semi-forest areas, according to data published in 2018.
The small eastern state of Nagaland has about 74% of its geographical domain covered in forests, one of the largest in India and emblematic of the country’s mountainous and remote Far East.
Its geography makes it home to some of the most inaccessible polling stations. The state has an outer border of about 215 km with Myanmar and security agencies closed border gates during the elections. More than 2,100 seats are allocated to the state, although it represents only one seat in the general election.
Some of those tiles are right along the outer border, but most of the tiles are well distributed across the state despite its mountainous terrain. In the 2024 elections, just under 60% of the registered electorate went to those polling stations.
In the northeast of the country is Sikkim, the country’s least populous state and the second smallest in terms of area. Sandwiched between Bhutan, Nepal and China, it also occupies a strategic location.
Near the Himalayas, Sikkim is incredibly mountainous and inaccessible. During elections, their polling stations are located almost exclusively in the southern part of the state. Partly because the mountains are some of the highest in the world. Kanchenjunga, the third highest mountain in the world, is on the border with Nepal. It is also heavily forested, with only about 50% of the state covered in thick forests.
With 290 polling stations, the electoral commission also targets a small electorate.
Unlike Sikkim, Delhi, India’s nerve center and capital, holds citywide elections with only about 2,700 polling stations in a domain only one-fifth the length of the Himalayan state. The city stalls are concentrated as close as possible to the city center, which is densely populated. However, around housing and government infrastructure, there are fewer positions because most people are not permanent citizens of the domain.
Election officials traveling to border areas carry all the required equipment and documents with them through rough terrain and obstacles.
Voting machines are packed in special cases after disconnecting the power source from the connected batteries once voting is complete. They are stamped with the official seal of the ECI and the candidates’ agents. Trips with these machines can last for days.
In a press release, the ECI noted that cars carrying EVMs and VVPATs will need to have a GPS tracking device so that their movements can be monitored.
In total, about 1. 8 million of those devices were used in the elections, which were rolled out in stages across the country. Once stored, the voting device is divided into an organization of 3 usage instances. These instances possibly differ depending on the device model, but the largest of the three is about 37 cm tall. When they are not in transit, they are placed side by side in groups in secure vaults, used by the electoral commission to prevent tampering.
In the north of the country is Himachal Pradesh, a small state of 70 million people, most commonly a mountainous region in the Himalayas bordering Tibet.
Against the backdrop of the snow-capped Himalayas stretching across a bright blue sky, the village of Tashigang in the Spiti Valley was the highest polling station in the world at the time of the vote, according to the ECI. 62 voters were registered to vote at the polling station located 15,256 feet above sea level. The election team used helicopters to reach the remote area.
These stations scattered throughout this region become incredibly important one day every five years when they are used by citizens in those remote places to have a voice in their country’s elections. Some are filled with other people and others receive a slow flow of incoming voters. in.
Rinchen, 23, a first-time voter, shows his inked finger outdoors at the polling station in the remote village of Warshi in Ladakh, home to a single family and five eligible voters, in India’s Ladakh region. May 20, 2024, REUTERS/Sharafat Ali
Voters line up outdoors at a polling station to vote in the first phase of the general election in Tiruvannamalai, Tamil Nadu, India, April 19, 2024. REUTERS/Navesh Chitrakar
A woman dressed in a burqa walks through a polling station during the first phase of the general election in Kairana, northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, April 19, 2024. REUTERS/Anushree Fadnavis
In the mineral-rich state of Jharkhand, polling stations are clustered around urban spaces and near bodies of water. This biodiversity-rich state, though not as forested as northeastern states, is more available to election officials who have set up nearly 30,000 polling places for the general election. With nearly 30 million people in the state, it has a giant electorate.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) has made elaborate arrangements to hold free and fair elections and that no voter is left behind.
Note
A small portion of the voting booths for Nagaland State have been removed, with coordinates outside state borders.
Sources
Election Commissions of India, Delhi, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Nagaland and Sikkim; GLAD (Global Land Analysis) Laboratory
Opening rendering by
Adolfo Arranz
Published by
Simon Scarr and Raju Gopalakrishnan